


Mystery of the Manaliths

by Darkrealmist



Category: Magic: The Gathering (Card Game)
Genre: Adventure, Art, Card Games, Curiosity, Dimension Travel, Dwarves, Exploration, Fantasy, Gen, Gods, Inspired by Real Events, Kaldheim (Magic: The Gathering), Magic, Magical Artifacts, Marvel References, Mystery, Parallel Universes, Post-Possession, References to Norse Religion & Lore, Science, Slice of Life, Snow and Ice, Trolls, Wordcount: 100-1.000, Wordcount: 500-1.000, Wordcount: Under 10.000
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-27
Updated: 2021-01-27
Packaged: 2021-03-13 05:49:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 520
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29023737
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Darkrealmist/pseuds/Darkrealmist
Summary: Tamiyo planeswalks to Kaldheim to research its lack of a moon, getting caught up in a mystery surrounding unexplained icy manaliths.
Kudos: 3





	Mystery of the Manaliths

Mystery of the Manaliths

Author’s Note: Inspired by the 2020 monolith incidents. Enjoy the story and R&R.

Disclaimer: I do not own anything related to or of _Magic: The Gathering_.

Card Reference: <http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=503846>

Summary:

Tamiyo planeswalks to Kaldheim to research its lack of a moon, getting caught up in a mystery surrounding unexplained icy manaliths.

* * *

In ruins Hamundar Forest concealed, the Planeswalker from Kamigawa flew a complete circle around the outer circumference of the glacial standing stones she found.

She’d catalogued similar artifacts in her field journal while out exploring planes. Amonkhet. Dominaria. The obelisks split among the Shards of Alara. Even the cryptoliths which warped the flow of Innistrad’s ley energy shared common structural principles.

Whether they were conscious of the underlying physics, the populations of these and other planes constructed such objects at the intersections of mana lines.

Manaliths were like ornithopters: Regardless of what corner of the Multiverse you were in, someone, somewhere, would always invent them come hell or high tide.

Now, you might be asking yourself: What’s a soratami researcher with a fascination in moons doing on a plane like Kaldheim, a world notable for having no moon at all?

Apart from hearing about its rich, storytelling cultures (stories to tell her story-circle), precisely that! Tamiyo was interested in observing effects on a plane without a lunar body present. Recording what forces, environmental or magic, substituted patterns a moon usually drove elsewhere.

After having her mind enslaved by Emrakul on Innistrad, and helping fight off an invasion on Ravnica, Tamiyo was ready to return to her role as a neutral academic.

She materialized on Axgard initially, then a ship escorted her to Gnottvold.

Seek one enigma. Discover another.

The totally transparent constitutions of these monuments were decorated with intricate, knotted runes that’d take a curious spirit to untangle and translate properly. A simple spell verified they were indeed (at least partially) formed using magic.

Though Tamiyo did not need a spell to support her intuition, scientific method was important. She would not expect a less sweeping inquiry out of her children.

Skalds characterized these manaliths a recent phenomenon in their mead-fuelled accounts. A manalith sighted in Bloodhammer Hall disappeared a short time later, the next appearing in a different realm, and so forth.

Tamiyo theorized Nahiri’s involvement, but her power suite centered on lithomancy, not cryomancy.

Kaldheim’s boldness for exaggeration and embellishment clouded the facts. Locals had their own opinions. They believed the cairns possessed otherworldly properties, were traps set by Valki, the Trickster-God, or that their dubious appearances foretell the opening of new Doomskars, calamitous collisions between the Ten Realms.

The moonfolk determined she’d interview witnesses with more credible knowledge of the various encounters.

Once Tamiyo cleared the clearing, a troll trundled out through the dense trees.

Svella was the troll’s name. A warrior and shaper of ice. The creator of the icy manaliths.

Tamiyo’s log entry summarized how preliminary evidence pointed to the manaliths’ arrival preceding a sublime event.

The Torga was just building art sculptures doubling as pillars she could sleep against.


End file.
